The 38-year-old actress - who has children Apple, six, and Moses, five, with husband Chris Martin - claims she is too much of a perfectionist and considers herself a "normal mother" like any other parent with a career.

She said: "One of my most negative qualities is the perfectionism that I have, and I think that I unconsciously project that because it comes from self-doubt and insecurity and that's the ironic part.

"I'm so deeply flawed. I'm just a normal mother with the same struggles as any other mother who's trying to do everything at once and trying to be a wife and maintain a relationship.

"There's absolutely nothing perfect about my life, but I just try hard."

The blonde beauty was once famous for her strict food regime, following a macrobiotic diet - focusing on grains and local vegetables while avoiding processed items - but she has now relaxed and admits her old eating habits now seem "alien" to her.

She added: "I haven't been macrobiotic in seven years, so it seems sort of foreign at this point. Although, a lot of the principles, like trying to eat whole foods and homemade foods and local foods and seasonal foods, that's still very much a part of the way I think about food."

Gwyneth is releasing her own cookbook, entitled 'My Father's Daughter', which is inspired by the meals she enjoyed with her late father Bruce Paltrow and she promises the recipes are ideal for family life.

She said in an interview with the USA Today newspaper: "It's American family food; it's very accessible and easy to make. It's mostly on the healthier side, although there are definitely some guilty pleasures in there."